PPP: Adding articles on poets
by George J. Dance '' Writing an article for Penny's Poetry Pages (PPP) is easy. It's a great way to get your own ideas on a subject out there. If you write poetry, you can even write an article about yourself. (I did.) To start with a simile: Articles on PPP are like the poems in an anthology. No one expects them all to be the same, and no one would want them to all be the same; if they were, it would be disppointing and probably rather boring. What facts you include. and how you say them, are up to the writer: you. If someone else doesn't like the result, they can suggest or make changes; but it's not their job to tell you how to write your article. At the same time, the poems in an anthology have a standard format, to make it easier for the reader to navigate, and that's what we try to do here. We mainly confine the standardization to level-2 headlines. (A level-2 headline is like the one below that says, "Introduction.") An article on a poet contains the introduction plus seven other main or level-2 sections: three text or paragraph-style sections, Life, Writing, and Recognition; and four point-form sections, Publications, See also, References, External links. The first two those should be written in paragraph form; the third can be paragraphs and/or lists; while the last four are lists. The following are guidelines for writing each section. Note that, unlike Wikipedia, you will not be banned or blocked, or have your articles deleted, for not following a guideline. However, also like Wikipedia, the editor-in- chief reserves the right to make formatting changes in your article to standardize it. As well, if you leave your article unsigned, anyone may work on the body of the article to improve it. If you do not want that, then sign your article. (The format for signing an article is the same as at the top of this one.) Introduction This is the easiest section to write. An introduction can be as short as one sentence giving only (1) name (2) birth (and death) date(s), (3) country of origin, and (4) the information that the subject is a poet. For example: : George Dance (born October 28, 1953) is a Canadian poet. That one sentence, along with (1) a reference and (2) an external link for more information, is an article, of the type that used to be known (on Wikipedia) as a 'classic stub.' So you could stop right there if you wanted. But you don't have to. You can list the person's major accomplishments, the things that would get a reader's interest. If the poet has one or two famous works, then mention it or them in the introduction to. You do not have to say "She is notable for...", but try to confine the introduction to mainly things the poet is notable for. You do not have to, and you are encouraged to not, give too many details in the introduction; save those for the appropriate section. Also, do not make your introduction too long: two or three paragraphs is enough. The preference here is for short introductions, so that the contents box (with its list of sections) shows on the same screen as the article title. And please do not give this section an "Introduction" headline. Begin your headlines with this next one: Life "Life" is the first standard heading. Not "Biography," as that sounds a bit offputting - "too much like a classroom" is how one contributor put it. You are free to make this section as long or as short as you like, and to add whatever subtitles you like to organize the section. Here suggestions; but you can use whatever divisions you like, or none at all. Youth Education Literary career Personal life Later years Death Keep the information, for the most part, chronological: that is, start with the poet's birth and end with her death, with everything in between arranged in order from birth to death. (For the most part, since you may want to deal with some aspects of the person's life in a separate subsection, like the "Personal life" in the above list). Do not include detailed information that belongs in another section. For example, suppose your poet won the Pulitzer Prize in 1989 for her book, ''Best Poetry Ever. You can mention in the intro that she won the Pulitzer, and in the "Life" section that she won it in 1989, but keep the complete details for the "Recognition" section (which is where a reader will be looking for them). Similarly, you can mention a poet's most famous book in the introduction and mention a number of works here; but reserve giving full information (year, publisher, etc.) for the "Publications" section. Writing This section covers detailed description and/or evaluation of the poet's work; both your own and other writers'. Once again, you can divide it into whatever subsections you want. Some articles have different sections for each book the poet has produced; some have no subsections at all. Other options for subheadings include: Style Themes Influences Reviews Individual works (by name) As a rule of thumb, a section should not be longer than five paragraphs, so if it gets longer consider breaking it into more than one subsection; but this is not mandatory. Quotations This is an optional section; use it only if you cannot fit the material into other sections. If you do add this or any other new sections, put them here: after the three written sections, and before the appendices or point-form sections. Recognition This section includes everything that has been done to or for the poet. Things that can be listed (and possible subheadings include: Awards Awards won by the poet in her lifetime, prizes, honorary degrees, etc. Avoid the term 'Honors' in the title, and at al lif possible: words with more than one possible spelling should be kept out of headlines at least, and out of text as well, wjere possible.. Legacy Schools, parks, prizes, or other things named after the poet. Influence Acknowledgements by other, well-known, writers of the poet's influence on their own work. In popular culture Modern references or allusions to the poet and/or her work. Publications Use this section to list the books the poet published. Do not call this section "Bibliography", since that could mean either of two things: a bibliography of the poet's writing, or a bibliography of the sources you used to write the article. You are again free to use what subheads you want, or none if you prefer. The recommended level-3 headings, and their order, are: Poetry use this subheading for books of poetry, not individual poems (see Poems section below). Plays This section should be only for plays that are published, If you are listing only published plays, you can add production information to these entries, too. However, if you are listing plays that were produced and not published, list them in a separate "Play productions" section following "Publications", and put the production information there, with only the publication information in this subsection. It's helpful to specity which are verse plays and which prose, if you have that information. Fiction If you use this section, please specify for each entry whether it's a novel or a short story; otherwise, you can divide books in it into sections: Novels Short fiction Non-fiction If you use this section, specify (if you can) for each entry what genre it is (memoir, essays, etc). You can break it into sections as well, but please use those as 4th-level sub-sub-sections, keeping them under the 3rd-level "Non-fiction subheading. Juvenile Includes books for young adults. Includes all genres above (If you use it,, pleas specify as you would for the adult books). If you don't think there's enough, children's work to merit a special section, you can mix them in with the appropriate adult headings; if so, please specify which are children's books. Translated Since this has priority over "Edited",, list books the subject both translated and edited here; please specify if he or she did both. Also specify co-translators before the title, in parentheses. (After the title, in parentheses, is the place to list other contributors to the book, such as other editors or illustrators). Edited Collected editions Normally this section is for multi-genre collections, usually posthumous. However, it can also be used for multi-genre collections published in the poet's lifetime, or for posthumously edited collections of any kind if that section is already sufficiently full. Other Level-3 headings you may wish to use, instead of the above include: Prose You can use this if you think the poet's prose output is too sparse to justify separate fiction and non-fiction sections. Conversely, if a fiction section would be too long (more than a dozen entries, you can split it into these two sections: Novels Short fiction As with the "Poetry section" - This should normally be used for Books, not for individual stories. Exceptions would be if the poet is famous for a certain story, if he won an award for it, or if it is the only story he ever wrote or had published. (Even if its he poet's only story to be found online, that is not a reason to list it here; instead, add a Prose'' subsection to '''External links, and link to it there.) Similarly, you can divide a long non-fiction section into different sections such as: Memoirs Poetics Essays Criticism Textbooks Anthologized For poems the poet had published in notable anthologies (such as the anthologies with articles on Penny's Poetry Pages). The value of including these is inversely proportional to the number of books you've already listed; if you have 3 or less, then by all means add anthologies; if you have 25 or more, then I'd say don't bother. Poems Short stories For individual poems and stories. (This is stretching things, so I wouldn't normally add these sections. Use them only if you have just one or two books, and your publication section looks empty. Even then, don't list every poem; try to keep it down to no more than a dozen best. Contrariwise, if the list is too long, you can cut it down, while giving the full list on a new page ("Poet X bibliography" - yes, the word can be used there), which you'd link to this section, by adding template at the beginning of "Publications", and printing a complete list of publications there, with only a partial one (including all poetry volumes, though) here. If you are including a separate bibliography article in this way, then you may list all of the poet's poems and stories there. Poems by ... This is a new section (still not contained in most articles), for listing and linking ONLY poems by the poet that are on Penny's Poetry Pages. Please do NOT use it for adding unlinked poems (those belong, as above, in a separate "bibliography" article) or for Externally linked poems (which belong in a Poems subsection of the External LInks section). See our article PPP: Adding poems for more information on how to add a poem to Penny's Poetry Pages. Essays by ... This is an even rarer section for lising essays by the poet that are on PPP. As with poems, so with essays: Only those in the public domain, or licensed under Creative Commons, should be added to PPP. As well, essays must be poetry-related (either biographical or critical). See also All PPP articles are meant to link either to a sidebar, or to a list that is linked to a sidebar. For example, articles on specific poetry groups link to "List of poetry groups and movements"; those on specific poetry awards to List of poetry awards, those on individual poets to a list on the poet's nationality, such as List of British poets or List of U.S. poets. Please add and link your article to an appropriate list, and use the "See also" section to include a reciprocal link from the article back to the list: for example, an article on an American poet should include a "See also" link to List of U.S. poets, and an article on a poetry award should include a link to List of poetry awards. If you are writing a new article, the time when you include a link to the list would be the time to include the article on the list. For example, you are writing an article on Z, an English poet, the steps to follow are: 1, In the 'See also" section of Z;s article, add the live link List of British poets; 2, using that link, navigate to that list and include an entry for "Z (birthdate-deathdate), England", and link that back to the article. 3, navigate from that list to the master list, usually List of English-language poets, and paste in the same information on Z. Finally, use that link to return to your article on Z. (You do not have to link the master list on Z's article, since the nationality list already appears in the sidebar). "See also" is also the section to add links to any PPP articles that are not mentioned (and therefore not linked) in your above text, but which you think readers of your article may find interesting or informative to read anyway. References Use this for your secondary sources of information. (Your primary sources, the works by the poet that you used, should already be listed in the "Publications" section.) Again, you can divide this into sections if you wish, but it is not necessary. If your only references are endnotes, then put them in this section, by including the prefereed template, , right here in the main section.. If you have other references besides endnotes, though , then it is best to put your endnotes in a separate subsecion called Notes. For example, if you are quoting extensively from a book or books, then list the books here; and mention only the author(s) and page number(s) in your inline citations, like so: Author, 252-253., and put the template in the Notes section. Fonds This subsection can also be called Archives. Use it to put any information on the author's archival papers, online or otherwise. It must be above your , as you should cite your authority for saying where the archives are, so if you are including it then add a separate Notes subsection underneath. Notes Put your endnotes here, by typing in this template: . We prefer two columns, to help distinguish our pages from Wikipedia and set off the External Links section that follows. External links Use this section for any outside links you think a reader may be interested in. Note that you can use the same external sources as both references and external links, since their purpose is completely different. (References are the authority for the claims you make in your article, while EL's are Recommended Further Reading. for readers wishing to learn more about a subject.) If you are in doubt as to what to include or not include as an External link, check the guidelines PPP: External links (for what to add) and PPP:External links (for what not to add). It is helpful to divide your EL list to make it easier for the reader to use. Do not, though, use level-3 subheadings (like the ones above) - those show in the contents box, and you already have enough in that. Use semicolons instead (for example ;Poems), which will appear as in the headings below. Standard divisions to the External links section include: ;Poems * Written texts of poems by the poet featured elsewhere on the web. . Poets.org, the Poetry Foundation, Representative Poetry Online, Poets' Corner, and The Penny Blog are examples of sites to use here; but there are many other poetry sites on the web. * Because many readers do not have that much time, and want a quick look to start, it is advisable to put sites with one or two fewest poems at the top of your list, and sites with 50 or 100 down at the bottom - but like most of the guidelines, this is a recommendation, not a rule. ;Books *Here is where you list longer selections of the poet's work, both online books and downloadable ones from sites like Gutenberg. *Use this space also for Worldcat, the International SF database, and other external lists of works including other sites' bibliographies. *If you want to include a publisher's page of books by the poet, include it here as well. ;Audio / video * In this section, put all audio or video material, including readings of the poet's poems, TV or radio documentaries, and interviews, in that order. ;About * Use this section for biographical information such as other online encyclopedias, and for scholarly articles on the poet's work.The standard order here would be: introductory information (including encyclopedia articles and obituaries), poet's website and blog (if she or he has those), interviews, and reviews. (If you want to include five or more interviews, or five or more reviews, you can put them in a new subsection immediately following.) * Except for obituaries (which normally give a retrospective on a poet's whole career), it is not normally a good idea to include articles on specific events; it would be better to cite those as endnotes. One exception would be if the event was a highlight (like the poet winnning the Nobel Prize), and you want to link to a number of articles. In that case, it would be best to include those articles in a separate subsection immediately following this one. ;Etc. Use this section for links that don't fit anywhere else. The most common are links to legacy things, like archives, monuments, awards, and fan club sites. And you're done. Except that you have to: Add a category Every article needs to be in at least one category, or some people will be unable to find it. Four that you can always use are: "19__ births" (fll in the year), "20__ deaths" (or, alternatively, "Living people"), "Canadian poets" (or "American poets", or "English poets"), "English-language poets" (or French-, Spanish, or whatever language the poet wrote in; you may include more than one) and "Poets". (Note that we want the poet to appear in the "Poets" category too, since that category page is used as the index of all poets on PPP). In order to have your article properly alphabetized within its categories (ie,by surname), you will have to include a Default Sort. The way to write that is to include the following immediately after your external links: For example, if your article is on John William Smith, you would type: Also, in the same area, include the year of your article's creation, in the same curly brackets, which adds another category. And now you're done. Congratulations on a great article. I hope you enjoyed it, and that you'll want to write more. Category:How-to articles Category:Writing